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NephMadness

I spend some of my blogging time at AJKD’s blog, eAJKD. We have just launched what I think is the most ambitious project the nephrology blogosphere has seen. It is an NCAA-style tournament of the biggest ideas in nephrology.

Get PDF and PPT versions of the brackets at eAJKD.com

On the surface, it is simply a set of brackets that pit 64 different ideas, projects, discoveries and drugs against each other. But what makes this important are the descriptions of all 64 entities. The National Cooperative Dialysis Study was published in 1981, the year my fellows were born. They have no knowledge of these landmark moments in dialysis. The 8 posts which describe all 64 concepts can be found here:

Some of the descriptions of the match-ups are awesome. Top notch blogging. Definitely worth perusing through.
I had my partners and fellows fill out brackets today. They all had a lot of fun doing it. There is something light and joyful pitting these heavy topics against each other in totally absurd ways. Take a crack at it, have fun. Post your brackets to twitter with the hashtag #NephMadness or email them to nephmadness@cluemail.com.
Here are some of the highlights from today. 
Dr. Steigerwalt

Dr. Steigerwalt is a hypertensive specialist and a big proponent of ACEi/CCB combination so I was sure she was going to select ACCOMPLISH over ALLHAT. Interesting that she went the other way and brought ALLHAT all the way to the Final Four. When she first glanced at the brackets she told me how couldn’t ESRD Medicare Benefit win it all? Well, she answered her own question because in the face of the RCT, even the Medicare ESRD benefit falls. Rounding out her final four is kidney transplant and UpToDate.
Keith Bellovich, Fellowship Director
Dr. Bellovich and I are are on very similar wave lengths and I agree with finals matchup and a lot of his early round choices. His Final four are: ESRD Benefit, Transplant, FGF-23, and NephSAP. His Cinderella team, the NCDS, going all the way to the Elite 8! He also has the TTKG making an improbable run to the sweet 16.
Three fellows filled out brackets. I will protect the innocent and just summarize their choices:
Fellow 1
  • Final Four
    • Randomized Controlled Trial
    • FGF-23
    • UpToDate
    • Kidney Transplant
  • Cinderella: Burton Rose Clinical Physiology of Acid Base… going to the sweet 16 from a 13 seed
Fellow 2
  • Final Four
    • Randomized Controlled Trial
    • ACCOMPLISH
    • Transplant
    • UpToDate
  • Cinderella: ACCOMPLISH, a 12 seed advancing to the final 4. Honorable mention the U/A and Rose’s book both to the Sweet 16.
Fellow 3
  • Final Four
    • Randomized Controlled Trial
    • FGF-23
    • UpToDate
    • Kidney Transplant
  • Cinderella: Burton Rose’s Clinical Physiology of Acid Base, and Rituximab… going to the sweet 16. And the DOPPS study (which has not been getting any love in the brackets I have looked at) going to the Elite 8!
Since I have a role running the tournament I will keep my brackets secret until a winner is declared.

Update:

Graham Abra, of the Renal Fellow Network was doing what all bracketologists do, trash talking other people’s brackets. This is what he had to say:

@kidney_boy FGF-23 in 2 of 3 fellow final 4s!? Sooooo you like surrogates? Surrogates in BMD? Where no rx impacts ANY hard outcome?;)
— RenalFellowNetwork (@RenalFellowNtwk) March 19, 2013

Here is my fellow’s reply:

I liken FGF-23 to the Gonzaga of college basketball.  It shows up whenever you talk about MBD-CKD (as the bball team makes it to the bracket almost every year)  you know it has a huge impact but not sure how much to apply it to clinically taking care of patients, but you are just waiting for the time that it all fits (aka Gonzaga wins the championship)

My reply:

@renalfellowntwk Also the idea that there is a new hormone central to phosp regulation that went undiscovered for so long is kind of sexy
— Joel Topf (@kidney_boy) March 19, 2013